I'm your F*CKING Boss - Section 03 & 4 | A course in Leadership
Kareem H Mostafa
Project Manager | Project Management, Business Development, Construction Management and Project Delivery
Click?here?if you did not read?Section 01, and here if you did not read Section 02.
Section Three: Communication is Key
Effective leadership requires communication skills.
In this section,?you will learn about the importance of communication to the relationship between you and your staff members. You will also delve into the art of communication.
You will also discuss how to provide effective feedback.
Communication Skills
One of the most critical skills possessed by good leaders is communication skills. A great boss will focus on clarity, accuracy, and thoroughness in communication; this will dictate your eventual success and is the best way to avoid miscommunication and keep your team on the same page. When relaying instructions, recapping meetings, or just doling out company updates, strive to be clear and concise in person, through email or voice mail, on the telephone, or in any other communication medium.
Managers who are skillful communicators listen with full attention to employees’ concerns, adapt their communication based on each employee’s personality style, and manage conflict so that all parties experience a satisfactory outcome.
Communication is one of the essential tools for business success. Whether the relationship is a staff member to team lead, team lead to manager, manager to director, director to vice-president, vice-president to the president, and right on up the line. If there is a failure to communicate, there is a problem.
Like the real estate agents’ number one rule – location, location, location — the mantra in business should be – communication, communication, communication.
Generally, a manager’s success is directly tied to their ability to focus on the business fundamentals – like discipline, accountability, strategic alignment, managing to company values, and empowering employees.
Great bosses have already mastered the essential functions of management such as leading, planning, organizing, staffing, controlling, and communicating, and communication is undoubtedly the thread that ties everything together. Clear communication is essential at all levels.
Managers lead and motivate through communication. Businesses promote discipline, accountability, and strategic alignment with clear communication. Market leaders promote their products and services using contact through compelling advertisements and marketing campaigns.
Good communicators make good managers.
Mastering the Art of Communication
Clear communication is always a two-way process. It is not enough to speak clearly; you have to make sure you are heard and understood. Sometimes we believe we are transparent with directions, and we fail; sometimes, we are abundantly clear, but we are not heard.
Great leaders have a communication plan that is quite simple and uses only a few steps:
In preparing how you will communicate, the first step is clarifying the goal of the communication: Do you need to discuss a change in policy with the entire team? Or do you need to take disciplinary action with one staff member? No matter the reason, it will be necessary to plan carefully before communicating it. Will it be sent out through email, at a team meeting, or one-on-one? Before the communication is sent, a great boss will anticipate the receiver’s viewpoint and feelings.
It is essential to express your meaning with conviction in delivering the message. In the example of communicating a policy change, clearly articulate why the changes are required and what this will mean to the entire team. Good bosses know they need to relate their message to the larger goals of the team and the company and then identify the action to be taken. To avoid miscommunication, it is necessary to confirm that the other person understands exactly what you are saying and why it is being communicated.
High Stakes
The stakes are high when it comes to communicating – if you fail to do this properly, you can poison the workplace atmosphere and your company’s morale. Before sending a letter, email, or communicating in person, a great boss will stop considering its impact and common barriers to effective communication.
Keep these points in mind when communicating:
The bottom line is that clear communication is one of the most important aspects of a business leader’s success. To be successful as a leader, you must learn to be a compelling communicator. You and your team also have to master the art of clear communication together. By using these and other strategies, you and your employees can reach new levels of leadership excellence.
Characteristics of Effective Feedback
As part of good communication and to help employees develop to their full potential, effective leaders know how to provide frequent positive and constructive feedback in a way that motivates both under-performing and high-performing employees.
Review objectives with your team regularly to ensure expectations and goals are clear. In conjunction with this, on a consistent basis, analyze employee performance and provide them with useful, honest, and specific feedback about their performance.
A key reason that high-performing employees stay at their jobs is that they have the opportunity to learn and grow. Leaders help organize and institute career development plans with their employees and follow up to ensure the plans are implemented.
One goal of feedback is for it to contribute to an improvement in future performance. Even when it does not lead to a desired level of performance, the meeting itself provides the platform to discuss expectations, results, motivation, and how to succeed. For employees (or even suppliers) who choose not to perform at an adequate level, the meeting serves as a benchmark within the larger performance management arena. If an employee refuses to comply, has been supported and coached to do well, and continues to refuse, then the supervisor has the necessary means to move into a disciplinary performance management plan.
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When feedback is perceived to be negative (because of our own behavior, or perhaps because it is not well delivered), people will naturally try to avoid it or minimize the negative effects. However, we need to let people know that it can be a great tool for personal development, especially when we include information on both the issues and the possible solutions. With this in mind, let’s delve deeper into the six major characteristics of effective feedback.
Providing Feedback
Think of someone specific who works with you (this person could be an employee, an employer, or a peer). In the space below and using the guidelines from the previous pages, write down some effective feedback you could give to that person when you return to work after your course is completed. Share your thoughts in the comments section.
Section Four: Common Sense
How many times do we hear: If they had just used some common sense, that never would have happened? Some people have common sense in spades, others – not so much. But possessing common sense is a skill that great leaders have.
In this session,?you will explore ideas on being a great leader using one tool: common sense.
Using Common Sense
Successfully leading a group of people who work for a company involves one thing and one thing only: Getting the most out of them every day. That applies to whether you work for a company developing cutting-edge products, carrying out top-secret missions, or building an empire.
Being a good boss is hard but not complex. And most of it involves using plain old common sense. Common sense is like a muscle – it has to be exercised to be effective.
But just because something takes common sense does not mean it is commonly practiced. Indeed, most everyone can recall an event in their workplace where common sense was most definitely?NOT?practiced.
For example, a staff member who has an issue with childcare for a short period: Common sense should dictate that flexible hours for that employee during that time would be a viable solution. Instead, a horrible boss may demand that the working hours are a particular set time and that employees with a childcare issue should take a vacation to deal with it.
Consider a customer who received an incorrect order. A common-sense solution would be to apologize to the customer for the mix-up, assure them that steps are being taken to make sure it does not happen again, and then make sure the customer is ultimately satisfied with the corrective measure. Not using common sense: blame the customer for providing unclear directions in placing the order, express exasperation at what this mix-up means to?you, and assign blame to the staff member who originally dealt with the order.
A good leader will use common sense when dealing with employees and customers. A?great?leader will instill this same common-sense approach in their staff members so they, in turn, can use common sense when dealing with clients and customers. You are not trying to re-invent the wheel. Just deal with the situation in the most direct way for the maximum result.
Sure, being a great boss takes one part peacemaker, one part best friend, one part disciplinarian, and one part organizational genius, all adding up to be the type of leader everyone wants to follow.
The Key to Successful Management
Victor Lipman wrote about why common sense is key to successful management in a Forbes article. Great leaders practice these common-sense, effective-management ideas:
- Treat me right
This common-sense practice is something most of us have heard as a familiar refrain while growing up: Do unto others… People like to be treated the way you like to be treated. Employees like to be treated the same as management likes to be treated – with fairness and honesty. Most employees respond best to fair, decent treatment from management and will work hardest when treated that way.
Treating staff members with courtesy does not mean you do not have high expectations of them – of course, you do. Expect excellence from people and do not settle for less. Not every employee will be a superstar, but they are all capable of giving superior effort.
- Be clear
Set clear, fair goals and hold employees accountable to them. Expectations should be formalized with well-thought-out goals and objectives that employees understand and buy into. If you are unclear in your expectations, employees are unclear in their direction, which can lead to poor results on all levels.
Accountability is fundamental, yet often neglected, even among senior managers. But it is management's job to hold people accountable to achieve results.
- Be a stand-up person
Do your best to show your employees that you can be trusted and that you are fair in your dealings with them as well as with customers. If you say something, mean it. Talk the talk and walk the walk. Do not make vague promises you cannot keep or have no intention of keeping – employees can see through that. Do not be duplicitous or political. In the long run, if you are 'plain dealing' with people, you will earn their respect, loyalty, and trust. And that is how a great boss leads.
This is the end of Section 03 & 04. Subscribe to The Spare to get notified when Section 05 is out!
Share your answers in the comments section, and in case you didn't, click here?if you did not read?Section 01, and here if you did not read Section 02.
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